Believing in Nothing"

Some very clever people are very sad people, which is one of the reasons I hate to see children pushed into thinking that academia and a uni education are the main goal in life.

I know a lot of very very intelligent people who could not be described as happy; and who would have loved to work with their hands and follow a completely different career. If you are bright you get channeled down a narrow route.

I am not religious, but I do believe in love and kindness.

Does your brother need to see his doc.

Yes, he has been diagnosed as bio polar, same as my mum and sister. He got his intellectual freedom m my dad but my dad managed to stay very stable. Its very sad what my brothers been through....many several fortunes and local st them all. He's so lucky his family have stuck by him. He's even auto Darwin in his vibered conversation tonight. Well, I prefer to delude myself!

I meant he got his intellectual ability from my dad.

Darwin's got a lot to answer for.disallusioning people.

Disillusioning people of what though, wot?

You are so right Lucky. I was watching a talk from TED talks on youtube and the guy was saying how it is encouraged from an early age to be good at maths and literature, language, science but not encouraged is the arts, music, dance, art, etc, that is always low down on the order of academic priority. But, he said, it is natural for us as children to sing and dance and we are channelled into not doing it as we grow into secondary school. Who doesn't feel better after a good sing song or a boogie? We should dance and sing every day. I do think that school and then college and university narrows as it goes along until everything is taken away apart from the subject studied. It can't be good for the mind and body to do this. Only a part of the brain is being used and not the whole body. Universities and colleges should have dance sessions or loosening up sessions before classes and at breaks, maybe the end of a lecture, five minutes to shake it all out. We do need doctors and lawyers but everything needs a degree these days so they become less powerful than they used to be and so a higher degree is needed to stand out, more study, more stress, less shaking it about.

Wot Is your brother married, does he have children or DGC? What job does he have? I am sure that you let him believe what he wants about love or spiritualism but to be depressed is a different matter. Does he go to any sport activity or dance or in a choir or karaoke? It is great to be brainy, smart, clever, my DS is, but he is the same, he needs to loosen the limbs a bit, but try and tell him and I might as well be Shirley Valentine talking to the wall!

Look up Richard Simmons on youtube, he will make you shake it out and have a good laugh too. He is very hyper though.

You are all making intellectual studies sound mean, narrow and spiritually diminishing and I think that is absolutely wrong. I am part of a family that are academically bright and embrace academic study with delight and find it spiritiually uplifting and that it brings joy and pleasure into our lives.

Our family of four can round up one PhD, 5 Masters degrees, and 5 first degrees. Four of those degrees were studied in later life as a result of the pleasure got from a leisure pursuit and a desire to understand the subject more. Our family also includes one morris dancer, one opera singer/producer, an actor, a long distance swimmer, and gifted needlewoman.

Academic attainment does not preclude an enjoyment of the arts and sports nor does it necessarily make you narrow minded blinkered, anymore than anyone less academically gifted. My experience has been that distribution of spiritual angst/depression/ bi-polar and other mental problems is unrelated to intellect. You are as likely to be intellectually challenged and depressed as you are to be intellectually gifted.

I am sad for wot and others that family members are so troubled, but it is unlikely that it is caused by their academic attainments or attributes.

My 91 year old cousin has just died. She was an atheist all her life and had an extremely successful, fulfilled and enjoyable life. Her most recent (academic) book will be published soon. I don't think religious belief is any protection against depression or academic interests any detriment to the enjoyment of life or having a wide variety of interests.

That's why me and himself so happy then,weme both fick,

I don't believe that anyone "believes in nothing". Everyone has beliefs and everyone gets ill sometimes. I'm including illnesses on the 'depression' spectrum. I expect your brother's depression (if that's what it is) has bugger all to do with how clever he is, wot, and bugger all to do with his beliefs.

Is chicken pox caused by lack of belief in something?

I do wonder about love sometimes.

When we feel love for our family, is it just us feeling protective of our own gene pool? The love we may have for a pet, just a substitute for a young child dependent on us? When I hug a very dear old friend, is ithe love I feel for her just the fact that she encompasses so many of my childhood memories? Is the love we feel for our other halfs really just the need for close companionship - having one person you are most important to?

Maybe all love can be explained away by reasons more grounded in human nature. Maybe we're not capable of pure love.

Perhaps he's onto something wot.

I can't believe I just posted that pre-Valentines Day.

Academic success does not automatically mean unhappiness; but it is important that people who are academically gifted have wider choices as indeed should all pupils. The current system of education focuses on narrow academic achievement rather than a breadth of subject matter to create balanced people with a good awareness of all their choices.

I do not know what "pure love" is really - love is what it is, and it is likely to be grounded in our physical nature and the biological imperative to reproduce and to preserve our offspring.

Can I just add that,as a lifelong sufferer of depression,I feel that your brother should see a doctor.If he is "deeply depressed" as you say,then he needs to seek help urgently.
Beliefs have nothing to do with it-I am not religious but I am spiritual and always have been.However,this has not helped with my depressive episodes.
Please encourage him to get help.

Jingles, we/I need to kid myself/believe in something, even if it is just a salve against the harshness of the world! And life would be so boring if it didn't hold mysteries and was just all physical. Water and electricity, according to big brother!

Oznan, the poor man has even been sectioned about 2 years ago as he got so manic. He's supposed to be on meds but I don't know if he takes them. We used to be very close but he has become distant for over a year, and the fact that he lives in Holland and all the rest of his family [3 grown up children and 5 grandchildren makes it difficult to find out exactly how he is. He tends to be quite secretive with his family. Opposite to me!
I'm an open book! [blabbermouth] I do feel so sorry for him though.

jings, re your post at 0949, does it matter what love is and whether it's pure so long as it makes us be nice to others? It's our behaviour that matters in the end rather than our feelings, though obviously feelings do influence how we choose to behave.

Wot - sad about your brother not believing in love - has he just retired from work? A lot of men can't cope with that. He's not needed any more.
I think there are different kinds of love. There's that special feeling of recognising thoughts and attitudes similar to your own that I get with my children, and with my sister - you seem to "click". I had it with Dad too, but not Mum for some reason.
Then with husband, as Jings says, the mutual need for companionship ( after the lust has died down!)
And pets, because they're always so pleased to see you.

You're right bags. I am over-thinking it. I think.

Even those that profess to believe in nothing often say a prayer when times are difficult

The current system of A levels is far more flexible than when I was in school in the 1960s.
Then you did Arts of Sciences and only did 3 subjects. Now they do 4 usually, at least for the first year in the 6th form. For example a young friend of mine is doing Biology, Chemistry, Sociology and English. She also does dance in her own time.

If he volunteered, he might feel more needed.

I've know quite a lot of highly intelligent people (mostly men) who work in maths and physics. Two things have stood out: they are very often very musical - many play musical instruments; and in the past, though not so much these days, mathematicians were looked on as ( not always just slightly) odd! I've never thought of any of them as any more unhappy or depressed as any other group of people though.

Has anyone read Paulo Coelho books? I don't go along with all of it but he has a take on love and spirituality. His most well known book is 'The Alchemist'.

I think love for humans is a physical, mental and/or emotional expression of attraction which is the source of existence and hold the universe together. Everything from the smallest atom to the planets and stars are held in place and depend on the attraction of atoms etc. We all need to love and be loved to be truly happy and flourish - whether it be from a partner, family or a pet.